Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/State Highway 93 (Karnataka)

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The following discussion is an archived debate of the proposed deletion of the article below. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.

The result was no consensus. This discussion is divided between those editors who say this article subject is notable because of WP:GEOROAD and those who disagree with that position. I don't believe any additional relisting will result in a consensus and a closer shouldn't introduce their own interpretation of policy or my role becomes that of a participant rather than a discussion closer. Liz Read! Talk! 01:24, 16 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

State Highway 93 (Karnataka)[edit]

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State Highway 93 (Karnataka) (edit | talk | history | protect | delete | links | watch | logs | views) – (View log | edits since nomination)
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Roadcruft, fails WP:GNG, doesn't get a pass from WP:GEOROAD either. Avilich (talk) 00:28, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

  • SNOW keep WP:GEOLAND explicitly says: International road networks (such as the International E-road network), Interstate, national, state and provincial highways are typically notable. Repeated discussions at WP:USRD/P and Wikipedia:WikiProject Highways/Precedents (including several recent discussions) have upheld this. Yes, this is India. But we have articles for most state highways in the US, and this AFD just goes to further systemic bias. I will try to search for sources, however with the number of concurrent AFD discussions it is becoming more difficult to do so. --Rschen7754 01:30, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    • Besides the ones I found below, I suspect there are likely more sources somewhere, however I am hitting a language barrier (main language is Kannada) and paywalls. We have to keep in mind WP:NEXIST as well - we know the road was in existence in some form back into the 19th century [1] and I suspect that newspapers of that era will be very hard to find. --Rschen7754 02:50, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Note: This discussion has been included in the list of India-related deletion discussions. Rschen7754 01:31, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
"Typically" does not mean always, and the nutshell clearly indicates that there is no presumption of notability for anything other than populated places. What is more, artificial features are specifically required to have sources "independent of the bodies which have a vested interest in them", and the article only cites a government website, so the notability here is nonexistent. Avilich (talk) 02:27, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
My concern as I will express elsewhere is that "typically" is here being interpreted to mean "never". --Rschen7754 02:32, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
"Typically" means "A geographical area, location, place or other object is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are, in the case of artificial features, independent of the bodies which have a vested interest in them". It does not mean whatever the cited Wikiprojects think, whose opinions are irrelevant as per WP:LOCALCONSENSUS. Avilich (talk) 02:36, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Again, that's a government source, it's not independent and doesn't contribute to notability. Avilich (talk) 14:30, 2 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I was able to convert the PDF to images to OCR to text to Google Translate to poorly translate the Kannada-language document into English to get a gist of what the document contains. It is mostly a description of the villages and cities the highway passes through, with some distances between certain points. The only clear piece of information is that State Highway 93 was assigned as part of the Karnataka Highways Act of 1964. VC 05:06, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, in said document, page 12 [2] we read that all state highways are officially designated by the state government and published in the official Gazette. So this underlies the overall significance and inherent notability - this is more than one can say about most schools, for example. --Rschen7754 17:51, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
Governments do a lot of things. To say anything that appears in official gazettes needs its own article here is bullshit. There is no such thing as "inherent notability" here and its official designation can be covered in List of state highways in Karnataka, nothing stopping expansion of that article either. Reywas92Talk 18:00, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
But I thought legally defined populated places were inherently notable. --Rschen7754 18:08, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
They are "typically presumed to be notable". Doesn't mean we can't still discuss and delete or merge articles on them if coverage is inadequate. Reywas92Talk 01:13, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I don't see why this is any different from the case of state highways and why the same presumption doesn't apply here. Let's face it: neither you nor I can read Kannada, the native language. That language is not even using the Western alphabet and Google Translate barely works on it, so it is difficult to even search on it. The original creator vanished after three of their articles were redirected, seems coincidental to me. We can write at least a few paragraphs on a 120 mile road just using Google Maps, but suddenly that is not reliable and almost blacklist-worthy. So we are just going to further systemic bias and assume that a 120 mile road around since the 19th century has no possible sources in any language, online or offline, and thus delete it and set a precedent that will probably result in deleting every other state highway in Karnataka. Seems responsible to me. </sarcasm> --Rschen7754 21:21, 4 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
To add - it appears that this state highway was also discussed in the state legislature, see [3] - though thanks to the paywall and language barriers we have no idea what was said. Again, more than you can say about many state parks and schools. --Rschen7754 18:55, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Google Maps [4] indicates this is also known as Sirsi-Yellapur Road. We have these two articles [5][6] though even I would consider them borderline noteworthy. Google Books is more interesting, we have this [7] which is from a SPS company however the author might qualify as an expert. There is also a mention in here. (This doesn't mean that is all there is, or that any of us are necessarily done searching). --Rschen7754 02:16, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Is this serious? 1: primary source; 2: flood report, literally no coverage of the road whatsoever; 3: routine news reporting on heavy traffic, absolutely nothing on the road itself; 4: self-published source; 5: this is about localities near the road, not the road itself; 6: also covers sites near the road, not the road itself, again no coverage of the road whatsoever. Avilich (talk) 03:00, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
I've done a search on Karnataka "SH 93" and also came up with [10], though it is hard to tell what the excerpt was saying. Also [11]. To counter some of the rebuttals, biodiversity of what the road runs through is certainly relevant, not just for understanding what the road is today but possibly for environmental impacts. Same with the cultural significance. --Rschen7754 19:03, 3 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep per WP:GEOROAD. You can't ignore a consensus just because you don't agree with it. -- Necrothesp (talk) 11:24, 7 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
    The consensus is not "All highways are automatically notable and entitled to a crap two-line article no matter what, end of story, you can't discuss anything about the poor sourcing or even consider a merge" (content already at List of state highways in Karnataka). Reywas92Talk 20:37, 7 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Relisted to generate a more thorough discussion and clearer consensus.
Please add new comments below this notice. Thanks, Liz Read! Talk! 01:19, 9 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Same as above, GEOROAD doesn't confer intrinsic notability to roads. Avilich (talk) 01:41, 10 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The main argument you made was that "typically" does not mean "typically". And GEOROAD does not give notability to all roads, but it does to all state highways unless there is some overriding reason why a particular state highway should not have it (which there is none in this case). --Rschen7754 17:44, 10 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The main argument is that "typically" means "typically", not "always". The overriding reason is the lack of significant coverage, as detailed in the nutshell box in WP:NGEO. Avilich (talk) 21:02, 10 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
  • Keep It seems we are interpreting the guideline in different ways. My own reading of WP:GEOROAD leads me to believe that this state highway is notable. From the guideline: ...Interstate, national, state and provincial highways are typically notable. The guideline goes on to say significant coverage is required for "lesser roads". Bruxton (talk) 21:40, 15 December 2022 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of the debate. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page (such as the article's talk page or in a deletion review). No further edits should be made to this page.
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